


Harbour

by icarus_chained



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Aftermath, Comrades in Arms, Ficlet, Friendship/Love, Gen, Recovery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-06
Updated: 2013-01-06
Packaged: 2017-11-23 20:32:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 653
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/626246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/icarus_chained/pseuds/icarus_chained
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A tiny Clint & Natasha ficlet, set immediately following Avengers. Life and hopes and debts and things that are not love.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Harbour

**Author's Note:**

> I have a theme tonight, apparently. Aftermath and camaraderie. *shakes head at self*

Stark had given them a room. In theory because Stark Tower was about the only self-sufficient building in NYC right then, in theory because the Helicarrier was busy limping to port, in theory because it was only polite. But mostly, Natasha thought, because the six of them couldn't do much more than stagger painfully after leaving the restaurant, because after everything that had happened Stark wanted to keep them where he could see them, and also because all of them were too damn tired and too damn sore to argue about it.

And she was sore. She hurt. Nothing major, nothing deadly, but a thousand small aches, cuts and bruises, torn skin and aching muscles, heat and sting and constant, low-grade ache. She hurt head to toe, every joint and every muscle, her skin a map of battle. Clint, beside her, was as bad, ribs and arms and aching spine, his smile gone crooked and exhausted. They limped into the room Stark had assigned her, more or less ignoring the fact that he'd actually offered them two, ignoring the raised eyebrows and thoughtful glances that followed them as they staggered in together. Ignoring everything that wasn't each other, and the sound of the silence as they closed the door behind them. 

Screw it. Let the others think what they wanted. As she said. Too damn sore, and too damn tired.

Clint sank down onto the edge of the bed, stretching his neck cautiously, wincing faintly at the crackle of abused muscles. Natasha smiled faintly, the expression drifting almost absently across her face, and carefully lowered herself down beside him. 

And then simply sat there, shoulder to shoulder, with the silence and all their aches and pains.

"... So," Clint murmured, eventually. His eyes drifting closed, a tired little smile on his face. "Guess we won, then."

Natasha leaned sideways against him, dropping her head onto his shoulder, the vague humour bubbling up through her, giddy amusement and laughing, desperate relief. At his voice, soft and rueful in the silence. At the singing of battered muscles, the sting of cuts and the steady rise and fall of their chests as they breathed. She turned her face into his neck, his hair brushing her forehead and his pulse under her nose, and nodded around the rush of it.

"Guess we did," she whispered, her hands clenching into small fists in the remains of her gloves, her knuckles pressing lightly into his knee. Guess they'd won. The six of them, still standing at the end of it. The six of them, still alive, still kicking. Yeah. Guess they had.

He didn't say anything, for a second. Didn't move, just the gingery motion of his chest around battered ribs, the drift of his head onto hers. And then, with a faint snort, shaking his head above hers, he reached up to curl his arm around her shoulders and press his lips into her hair.

"Thank you," he whispered, soft and shaking, and she let her breath hitch, let the fear and the relief roll out, and wrapped her arms around his waist. "Thank you," Clint told her, and Natasha rolled over him, battered and aching in the silence, and held him tight. 

"De nada," she breathed, the steady beat of his pulse under her lips, things that were nothing that were also everything, life and hopes and debts and things that were not love. "It was nothing, Clint."

And his soft laugh beneath her touch, the hitch of his breath in turn and the tightening of his arms around her, told her that he understood. Everything and nothing. One more breath, where they were not dead, where they were still themselves. Yes, she thought. He understood that now. He always would.

"Nothing," he repeated, soft and smiling at the ceiling. Letting her hold him. "Because we won, right?"

"Yes," she whispered, her arms around him. 

Because they _had_.


End file.
